It is widely recognized that good problem solving and thinking skills need to be encouraged and supported. The increased capacity of computers and availability of electronic information bring an opportunity to support this need. The need is especially important and more difficult to address in situations of greater complexity, as in when the problem has many facets or portions to it, and/or when multiple problem solvers or contributors are involved.
Today, the development of problem solving and thinking and related topics often occurs as a result of many disparate activities. Most of these skills are taught separately and independently, or in a case by case basis, and are unpredictable in their results. Whether an individual or a team becomes and “end to end” problem solver—capable of defining a problem, finding and researching information, developing their own understanding, defining alternatives and an answer supported by their work, and communicating their views effectively—is uncertain.
Computer and information technology support of problem solving and thinking is fractured and focuses primarily on information handling activities, or is isolated and non robust “thinking skills” support. Separate and independent software programs support search and retrieval, information manipulation and management, information presentation and communication, and others. While this may be comfortable for many adults, little computer support exists for “thinking” and analysis logic particularly for the more qualitative topics that predominate. There are no software enabled processes that help guide good thinking and address the complexity of today's problems, and that do so in a way that interfaces effectively with the information environment in which a user or group of users work.
There is a need for a software tool that enables and supports a comprehensive problem solving and thinking process, especially in information intensive situations. Many users of such a tool would want to do so effectively in the context of their larger information processing environments. This is especially desirable where the state of the art enables significant file transfer and other electronic communication between the tool that supports and enables thinking and problem solving and other electronically based systems, tools and resources, through commonly accepted approaches and standards.
In educational, business and personal situations, there is recognition of the need for improving the abilities of groups working on information intensive projects, in both the quality of the results and the efficiency with which information-intensive work is done. A significant portion of business, educational and personal (such as volunteer activities, hobbies and the like) endeavors involve the joint or in some manner cooperative conduct of information-intensive or inquiry-based projects by multiple individuals or even multiple sub teams. Such projects often include a broad range of problem solving activities, such as defining the problem or topic, finding and analyzing information, formulating conclusions, hypotheses and alternatives, and in many cases developing an answer or course of action, and others. Such group or collaborative or cooperative projects also often result in the production of one or more reports or electronic documents or web sites to convey or share the findings and/or recommendations or views to others. The need for improved support therefore exists both in formal group or collaborative settings, as might exist for example in a business or other formal organization, as well as in informal collaborative or cooperative or joint authoring situations, as might occur around shared personal interests, hobbies, volunteer situations, social networks and the like, as well as in other business and organizational situations.
A large number of individuals can be classified as knowledge workers and routinely formulate understanding about and solutions to, and share or otherwise work together regarding rather unstructured or arbitrary problems. In formal situations, for example, research shows that most knowledge workers are assigned to teams for at least some portion of their work and that most teams are fairly large in their numbers of members. In addition, many if not most knowledge workers have professional or personal areas of interest in more informal settings, which they may pursue inquiry and the development of various documented understandings and reports as well. Informal communities of interest—whether professional or personal—are common, and individuals often seek each other out on an ad-hoc or informal collaborative or cooperative basis as well—sharing information and ideas about professional issues or personal hobbies and interests and the like.
Despite the prevalence of formal groups and informal collaborative or cooperating networks conducting information-intensive projects together, computerized support for generalized, collaborative or cooperative inquiry-based projects in these situations is lacking. Most teams or collaborating individuals utilize at best a loose collection of computerized tools such as the Internet and search engines to find information, E-mail, tools such as Outlook, in some cases social networking tools to seek out others and communicate, and document production tools like Power Point or web site authoring tools to produce results. In some instances, the teams may use tools to share documents and control versioning, or otherwise find and manage the ownership and access to documents. However, generalized computer-based collaboration systems tend to focus on the mechanics and basics of communication and document change management control and access management, and sharing, as opposed to providing support and additional value to the group or collaborative or cooperative thinking, problem solving and information process itself.
There is a significant need for a system and method that enables generalized multi-user and group information-intensive thinking and problem solving in a collaborative or cooperative manner to address these and additional needs and problems. There is a need for a software tool that enables and supports a comprehensive problem solving and thinking process for collaborating or cooperating groups or networks of multiple users, especially in information intensive situations. Many users of such a tool would also want to do so effectively in the context of their larger information processing environments. This is especially desirable where the state of the art enables significant file transfer and other electronic communication between the tool that supports and enables thinking and problem solving and other electronically based systems, tools and resources, through commonly accepted approaches and standards.